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TheAussieZombie

The Aussie Zombie

Zombie, post-apocalyptic and dystopian books are like shoes - you can never have enough.

Girl, Stolen

Girl, Stolen (Christy Ottaviano Books) - April Henry

I'm not normally a thriller-lover - I find them a little too cliched or the pacing is off - either too fast or too slow, and finding something in between can be difficult. But I did enjoy April Henry's The Night She Disappeared when I read it last year, and Girl, Stolen sounded interesting - after all, how often do you come across a blind protagonist?

The plot itself is fairly straightforward, but what I really enjoyed was the characters and the pacing of the book. It's pretty much non-stop from the very first page, and the tension builds quite quickly through to the climax. And it may seem like I'm starting this review backwards, but I was very impressed by the ending - unlike many YA books, April Henry invests a lot in the climax of Girl, Stolen - and the last quarter or so of the book is real edge-of-your-seat reading.

Told in alternating POVs between Cheyenne and Griffin, it felt like there was sufficient time to get to know both characters pretty well, even though this is a short book. Cheyenne isn't the perfect heroine, but she's determined and brave even though she has to rely on her other senses to help her to survive. As well as focusing on the present, flashes of both Cheyenne and Griffin's earlier lives give them a more rounded feel - I felt like I could understand both their perspectives and why they did the things they did.

Some of the secondary characters however, were a little bit lacking, as although they don't play a central role in the story, it would have been great to understand more about them, and have everything connected together.

Girl, Stolen is a one-sitting read - it's a fast read, but it's also an intense read with excellent pacing and the kind of writing that you can really feel comfortable in.

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Source: http://www.theaussiezombie.com/2013/07/review-girl-stolen-by-april-henry.html